


i love you to the grandfather clock and back

by scatteredmoonlight



Category: The Magicians (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Everyone Lives/Nobody Dies, Drunken Confessions, Fix-It, M/M, Mutual Pining, Pining, Watching Someone Sleep
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-28
Updated: 2019-08-28
Packaged: 2020-06-03 15:35:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,008
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19466959
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/scatteredmoonlight/pseuds/scatteredmoonlight
Summary: Quentin went into the mirror world and freed Eliot from the monster, only Eliot isn't happy. A party is thrown in his honor, but he can't enjoy it with Quentin now dating Alice.





	i love you to the grandfather clock and back

**Author's Note:**

  * For [LearnedFoot](https://archiveofourown.org/users/LearnedFoot/gifts).



“I’m trying to score us with Hottie McHotterson by the punch bowl,” drawled Margo, gloriously apathetic to anything else. “And, FYI, I don’t give a frack if Quentin hauled ass for you in the House of Horrors, he’s not invited, capisce?”

Eliot’s gaze slid over to the tall, muscular blonde in question in a short sleeved, red and black checkered plaid shirt. Those arms could plow hay barrel upon hay barrel upon hay barrel, and afterward still have the stamina to chop wood. Eliot smiled dreamily into his bottomless flask. Yet once his mind started to wander away, he was back to shooting daggers at Alice and Quentin. And how Quentin kept placing his arm around her waist. Eliot hadn’t realized that he’d spent half the night shooting daggers at Alice until Margot got in his face.

“So I’ll be doing the talking then,” said Margo.

Eliot murmured in reply and obediently followed her to the lumberjack.

It was the little things he missed the most after being possessed by an ancient monster, like the elegance of a flask mixed with a banger of a house party — thrown in his honor, naturally — or sauntering through the downstairs of the Physical Kids Cottage after the party had long raged on, never once stepping on anything sticky.

For a party dedicated entirely to him, it wasn’t that much fun. Yes, the music was exquisite, as much Beyonce and old school Madonna as it pleased him, but there was the matter of Quentin. And Alice.

But Margo was right, in a sense, and he tried to delete Quentin from his mind.

The lumberjack tumbled into bed with them not long after, and he was a good hook up. But somehow Eliot was disappointed. The guy wasn’t skinny enough. He was too cool. His guns were impeccable and his cock something of legend, but in the end, Eliot's attention went to Margo. He made out with her while the lumberjack hooked her legs over his shoulders and went to town between her legs. The sex was fun, and he’d never regretted making out with Margo — but it felt hollow. Meaningless.

Really, all Eliot could think about was Quentin holding Alice.

But, objectively speaking, regardless of He Who Must Not Be Named’s unprecedented decorum, the party had been an epic affair. He got wasted, hooked up, after said hooking up he even won at beer pong against the other Penny. But everything still somehow felt wrong.

Eliot’s favorite part was actually at the end, when Margo unleashed her inner boss and kicked everyone out without having to raise her voice. Five minutes later, the entire downstairs was free of any stragglers.

He took a sip from his flask and maneuvered around discarded empty plastic cups. He was actually on a mission. No one who wasn’t supposed to be in the cottage remained, and right now that consisted of the usual suspects in their merry little Fillorian band. Margo and Todd, which he still didn’t understand, had a sock over her doorknob. Alice was passed out in Kady’s room with Kady after binging on gummy bears. Penny and Julia left the party three hours ago. Only one person was left unaccounted for: Quentin. And his light snores were impossible to miss. They were burned into Eliot’s memory after suffering through them for forty years.

Eliot found him asleep on the couch, head tilted back and resting on the coach backing, a copy of _Fillory And Further_ open on his lap. Eliot quirked his head at that and swigged some whiskey, wondering how long he’d been upstairs with Margot and the lumberjack to miss that Quentin had spent some portion of the party reading a book. Wasn’t that his M.O. before coming to Brakebills? How could Alice have let him sink into a book, which Eliot knew was synonymous for Quentin peacing out from life? Didn’t anyone bother trying to help him enjoy this soulless party?

Softly so as not to disturb Quentin, Eliot sat down beside him and peered down at the words in the book. The Chatmans were being crowned as royals. Eliot winced, memories haunting him of being the High King, and he drank liberally from the bottomless, magical flask.

Quentin slept so soundly that his lips parted as he slept. Eliot smiled at him, feeling evermore drunk as he looked him over. There wasn’t a single worried line giving Quentin premature wrinkles, he was as relaxed as could be. The symphony of snores quieted as he exhaled only to break in sharp, sudden crescendos. God, he’d forgotten what a horrendous snorer Quentin was. It was only love that kept them sharing the same bed all those years.

He supposed the worst part of being back was having to accept that he’d never get the life he wanted. His dreams didn’t live in the past, since that time pocket didn’t really exist, and part of him still was happy he rejected Quentin. Running was easier than staying put only to get hurt. And he was tired, so tired of getting hurt. He didn’t know what he’d do if loving Quentin only led to pain.

Quentin’s snoring stopped short and he groaned, shifting in his sleep. Eliot froze and snapped back to watching his face, just waiting for Quentin to realize Eliot was creeping on him as he slept.

But he just moved a little, the book slipping off of him and partially onto Eliot’s leg. A few strands of hair fell over his face, and he grimaced unconsciously as it brushed his eyelashes.

Eliot couldn’t spin a time turner and save Quentin from an awful party, but he could try helping him sleep. He remembered how difficult it’d been sometimes for Quentin to get any sleep. He didn’t have any medication in Fillory to help with his depression and talking to Eliot could only help him so much.

Gingerly, Eliot reached out and brushed away those strands. He’d just intended to lay them over his head, but he’d forgotten how soft Quentin’s hair was. He didn’t dare card his fingers through Quentin’s hair since that would definitely awaken him, but he softly smoothed out the strands and slipped his fingers along Quentin’s hair.

Eliot missed this. He missed him. He already knew that he was the most collossally braindead dung beatle of the century, but it wasn’t until now that he really understood how stupid he was for turning Quentin down over a chance about being them, together, in love, for forty or sixty or however many years.

Ironically, Eliot had touched Quentin for so long, that it was removing his hand from him that wound up waking Quentin up. Seeing those sad puppy dog eyes blinking open in confusion and widening the second Quentin spotted Eliot was a sucker punch to Eliot’s heart.

Quentin straightened up, scooting a little bit away from him, and the book slipped from his lap. Quentin rushed to catch it before it clammered to the floor. He ran a hand through his hair to get it out of his face and looked anywhere but at Eliot. But it was impossible to not drink in the sight of him.

“Hey, um.” Quentin glanced at him shortly. “Hey, Eliot.”

He sounded panicked and strained, yet exhausted at the same time. Eliot just wanted to hold him, make him feel less alone. Eliot shifted on the couch, sitting partially on his ankle in order to turn toward Quentin.

Quentin tried to hold eye contact but couldn’t, laughing though neither had said or done anything remotely hilarious. He ran a hand over his leg to his knee and back, and Eliot couldn’t hold in his feelings anymore. He couldn’t shake the realization that Quentin could have died in the mirror world in his attempt to free Eliot from the Monster, and he never would have known that Eliot had lied to him back in Fillory.

Eliot drank from the flask and blinked past how strong the whiskey was. He hadn’t noticed the strength until now. “I lied to you before, in Fillory,” he said, rambling. “I never stopped loving you. I want to give us a chance.” Suddenly _Fillory and Further_ was the most interesting thing in the room, and Eliot furrowed his brows as he tried to parse some of the words, his old age of twenty-something catching up on him in his ocular health. “Alice isn’t right for you. I am. Pick me. I’m better. Also, we’re married, so…” He suddenly wished he’d done this a little more sober, or not at all really, and though he wanted nothing more than to vanish into nothingness and not hear Quentin’s response to that very romantic declaration.

“There isn’t anything between me and Alice,” said Quentin, matter of fact.

“You were with her all night.”

“She broke up with me tonight.”

Eliot smiled.

“But that’s — that’s not — Why didn’t you — ” Quentin broke off and sank a bit into the couch.

But Eliot understood him anyway. “It’s simple really. I’m an idiot who doesn’t deserve you. People I love don’t tend to stay. My dad hates me, my last boyfriend died. But I’ve never known anyone like you. You… complete me.”

He looked over at Quentin and didn’t find a happy man before him. Quentin’s mouth was twisted with a grimace and the wrinkles from all those years of sadness were stark lines around his eyes. Yet he sensed a little spark in him: Quentin didn’t break eye contact, his knees were turned to him. Maybe Eliot still had a chance to convince him. Maybe it wasn’t all lost.

Quentin tossed the book onto the coffee table. “Fuck it.”

And then it was like they went back in time forty years.

Quentin cupped Eliot’s cheek and kissed him, leaning over him on the couch and stabilizing himself by planting on arm beside Eliot’s waist, trapping Eliot between him and the couch. They kissed like they’d learned how to please each other for decades, kissing easier than the most elementary of magic. Eliot carded his fingers through Quentin’s hair and melted at the little groans Quentin made as he scratched his scalp, how he briefly stopped kissing him, just as Eliot knew he would, the second Eliot massaged the tips of his ears.

Eliot fell back to lay on the couch, pulling Quentin down with him, and they kissed until Eliot couldn’t breathe deep enough anymore from the weight of Quentin bearing down and crushing him. Quentin kissed along his jaw to nibble on his ear and suck hickeys like some sort of vampire on his throat. Eliot slipped a hand beneath Quentin’s shirt to touch his bare skin, scratching lightly as he did on his scalp.

This was it, he realized. What’d been missing with Margot and the lumberjack. Whatever it was between him and Quentin — love, it was love, and a history, he knew that even if it were hard to admit — and after living a lifetime of that with Quentin, he could never go back. He couldn’t have anything else but a life with him.

“Forgive me, Q,” he mumbled, eyes rolling back as Quentin bite him lightly. “Forgive me.”

Quentin surfaced to kiss his mouth. “There’s nothing to forgive.”

“No,” Eliot said between kisses. “I hurt you. I ruined us.”

Quentin rubbed his cheek with a calloused thumbed. “Yeah, you did hurt me. But there’s no way you ruined us. I mean…” He waved a hand over them. “And after the monster, I just… don’t care anymore. All I know is that I want you. The past is the past.”

 _The past is the past_. Eliot liked that. He brushed noses with Quentin like they always used to. “I don’t deserve you.”

“You’re probably right,” said Quentin, and he kissed him again. Filthily, too. There was tongue and open mouths and absolutely no preamble. Eliot wanted to spend the rest of his life like this, and then it hit him: He could. Nothing was stopping him anymore.


End file.
